Remember The USS Cole?

"Our friend has gotten a royal screwing,"

Kirk Lippold (commander on the Cole) is the first commissioned military officer or civilian official to be punished during George W. Bush's presidency for failing to prevent a terrorist act against the nation.

Bush has been criticized for not holding more people to account, particularly in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and for faulty prewar intelligence and poor war planning.

But now some are questioning whether the White House and Congress, in not acting on Lippold's Pentagon-approved promotion to the rank of captain, have nailed the right man.

Breaking his silence, Lippold, 46, says it's wrong to blame him.

"If you want accountability, there was one accountable officer on that ship, and that was me," Lippold said during a three-hour interview. "But if you want to blame me for allowing that attack on my ship that killed 17 of my sailors -- that is essentially putting me as a U.S. military commander in the war on terrorism on the same level as Osama bin Laden."

Read the rest of the story HERE.